Nobel Prize in Literature 1964 - Press Release Announcement Address by Anders Österling, Member of the Swedish Academy This year the Nobel Prize in Literature has been granted by the Swedish Academy to the French writer Jean-Paul Sartre for his work which, rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth, has exerted a far-reaching influence on our age. It will be recalled that the laureate has made it known that he did not wish to accept the prize. The fact that he has declined this distinction does not in the least modify the validity of the award. Under the circumstances, however, the Academy can only state that the presentation of the prize cannot take place. Refusal In a public announcement, printed in Le Figaro of October 23, 1964, Mr. Sartre expressed his regret that his refusal of the prize had given rise to scandal, and wished it to be known that, unaware of the irrevocability of the Swedish Academy's decisions, he had sought by letter to prevent their choice falling upon him. In this letter, he specified that his refusal was not meant to slight the Swedish Academy but was rather based on personal and objective reasons of his own.

As to personal reasons, Mr. Sartre pointed out that due to his conception of the writer's task he had always declined official honours and thus his present act was not unprecedented. He had similarly refused membership in the Legion of Honour and had not desired to enter the Collège de France, and he would refuse the Lenin Prize if it were offered to him. He stated that a writer's accepting such an honour would be to associate his personal commitments with the awarding institution, and that, above all, a writer should not allow himself to be turned into an institution. Among his objective reasons, Mr. Sartre listed his belief that interchange between East and West must take place between men and between cultures without the intervention of institutions. Furthermore, since the conferment of past prizes did not, in his opinion, represent equally writers of all ideologies and nations, he felt that his acceptance might be undesirably and unjustly interpreted. Mr. Sartre closed his remarks with a message of affection for the Swedish public. At the banquet, S. Friberg, Rector of the Caroline Institute , made the following remarks: "Mr. Sartre found himself unable to accept this year's Prize in Literature.

There is always discussion about this prize, which every one considers himself capable of judging, or which he does not understand and consequently criticizes. But I believe that Nobel would have had a great understanding of this year's choice. The betterment of the world is the dream of every generation, and this applies particularly to the true poet and scientist. This was Nobel's dream. This is one measure of the scientist's significance. And this is the source and strength of Sartre's inspiration. As an author and philosopher, Sartre has been a central figure in postwar literary and intellectual discussion - admired, debated, criticized. His explosive production, in its entirety, has the impress of a message; it has been sustained by a profoundly serious endeavour to improve the reader, the world at large. The philosophy, which his writings have served, has been hailed by youth as a liberation.

Sartre's existentialism may be understood in the sense that the degree of happiness which an individual can hope to attain is governed by his willingness to take his stand in accordance with his ethos and to accept the consequences thereof; this is a more austere interpretation of a philosophy admirably expressed by Nobel's contemporary, Ralph Waldo Emerson: 'Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.'" The quality of human life depends not only on external conditions but also on individual happiness.

In our age of standardization and complex social systems, awareness of the meaning of life for the individual has perhaps not been lost, but it has certainly been dulled; and it is as urgent for us today as it was in Nobel's time to uphold the ideals which were his." From Nobel Lectures , Literature 1901-1967, Editor Horst Frenz, Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature: Why Jean-Paul Sartre Refused the Controversial Award in 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature: Why Jean-Paul Sartre Refused the Controversial Award in 1964 Lydia Smith French writer and existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 - 1980) More The literary Nobel Prize has had a history steeped in controversy since it was first awarded in 1901. But perhaps no other year has been more interesting than 1964, when Jean-Paul Sartre discovered he was among the writers being considered for the laureate.

A French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, literary critic and political activist, Sartre was one of the leading figures in French philosophy of the 20th century, and the driving force behind the school of reasoning known as existentialism. When rumours began circulating that he was in the running for the prize, Sartre immediately wrote to the Swedish Academy to inform them he wanted to be withdrawn from consideration. Unaware that no consultation made between the academy and nominees, Sartre was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his work "rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth". He refused it, citing both personal and objective reasons in a statement made to the Swedish Press on 22 October. But why did Sartre refuse the literary Nobel? Personal Assuring the press that his decision was not an "impulsive gesture", one of the reasons Sartre gave for rejecting the prize stemmed from his habit of refusing all official honours. In 1939, Sartre was drafted into the French army where he served as a meteorologist, before being captured by German trooped in Padoux in 1940.

He spent nine months as a prisoner of war, and in 1945, he was offered the Legion of Honour – and refused it. Sartre believed every individual is responsible for creating a purpose for their life. By accepting the prize, Sartre would inadvertently associate himself with the institution that honoured him. His humble conception of the writer's "enterprise" – as he called it in his explanation – led Sartre to believe that those in political, social or literary positions should only "act with the means that are his own – the written word". "The writer must therefore refuse to let himself be transformed into an institution, even if this occurs under the most honourable circumstances, as in the present case," he said. "This attitude is of course entirely my own, and contains no criticism of those who have already been awarded the prize." It is evident that he wanted to accept no award that would add weight to his name. "If I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre it is not the same thing as if I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre, Nobel Prizewinner," he said. Beyond disputes over which contributor's work was worthier, countless other authors have criticised or dismissed the prize for personal reasons.

Haruki Murakami, one of the writers tipped to win this year's prize and a long-term favourite, previously laughed off the possibility of winning the coveted award saying he didn't want prizes – as "that means you're finished". Cold War politics and objectives After the Second World War, the second period of Sartre's career involved highly publicised political involvement – when the world was split into communist and capitalist blocks. Sartre embraced Marxism but did not join the Communist Party. As one of the first French journalists to expose the use of Siberian labour camps, he attacked what he saw as abuses of freedom and human rights by the Soviet Union. Sartre cited his conflicted loyalties between the East and the West as another reason why he declined the Nobel. Although sympathetic to socialism and the Eastern bloc, he had been brought up in a Western "bourgeois family" - and accepting the award would inevitably mean he had been "institutionalised in either East or West". At the time, Sartre said he regarded the prize as a "distinction reserved for the writers of the West or the rebels of the East".

"This is why I cannot accept an honour awarded by cultural authorities, those of the West any more than those of the East, even if I am sympathetic to their existence. Although all my sympathies are on the socialist side. I should thus be quite as unable to accept, for example, the Lenin Prize, if someone wanted to give it to me, which is not the case." Controversies Although Sartre openly said he regretted the incident had become a "scandal" – the writer was not the first, and certainly was not the last, to snub the prize for political reasons. Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges was nominated several times, but never won the prize. Some observed that Borges was omitted because of his conservative political views – specifically, because he had accepted an honour from Chilean dictatorship Augusto Pinochet. Read More Borges' failure to win the prize contrasts significantly with writers who openly supported left-wing dictatorships – as was the case with Sartre. Between 1901 and 1912, Sweden's antipathy towards Russia was cited as the reason neither Tolstoy nor Anton Chekov were awarded the prize.

During the Second World War, the Academy favoured writers from non-combatant countries. The heavy focus on European authors has been a subject of mounting criticism, as the majority of laureates have been European. In 2008, Horace Engdahl, the former secretary of the Academy claimed that Europe was still the "centre of the literary world". "The US is too isolated, too insular," he said. "They don't translate enough and don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature." Nobel Prize in Literature: Why Jean-Paul Sartre Refused the Controversial Award in 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature: Why Jean-Paul Sartre Refused the Controversial Award in 1964 October 9, 2014 11:14 BST French writer and existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 - 1980)Getty The literary Nobel Prize has had a history steeped in controversy since it was first awarded in 1901. But perhaps no other year has been more interesting than 1964, when Jean-Paul Sartre discovered he was among the writers being considered for the laureate.

A French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, literary critic and political activist, Sartre was one of the leading figures in French philosophy of the 20th century, and the driving force behind the school of reasoning known as existentialism. When rumours began circulating that he was in the running for the prize, Sartre immediately wrote to the Swedish Academy to inform them he wanted to be withdrawn from consideration. Unaware that no consultation made between the academy and nominees, Sartre was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his work "rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth". He refused it, citing both personal and objective reasons in a statement made to the Swedish Press on 22 October. But why did Sartre refuse the literary Nobel? Personal Assuring the press that his decision was not an "impulsive gesture", one of the reasons Sartre gave for rejecting the prize stemmed from his habit of refusing all official honours. In 1939, Sartre was drafted into the French army where he served as a meteorologist, before being captured by German trooped in Padoux in 1940.

He spent nine months as a prisoner of war, and in 1945, he was offered the Legion of Honour – and refused it. Sartre believed every individual is responsible for creating a purpose for their life. By accepting the prize, Sartre would inadvertently associate himself with the institution that honoured him. His humble conception of the writer's "enterprise" – as he called it in his explanation – led Sartre to believe that those in political, social or literary positions should only "act with the means that are his own – the written word". "The writer must therefore refuse to let himself be transformed into an institution, even if this occurs under the most honourable circumstances, as in the present case," he said. "This attitude is of course entirely my own, and contains no criticism of those who have already been awarded the prize." It is evident that he wanted to accept no award that would add weight to his name. "If I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre it is not the same thing as if I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre, Nobel Prizewinner," he said. Beyond disputes over which contributor's work was worthier, countless other authors have criticised or dismissed the prize for personal reasons.

Haruki Murakami, one of the writers tipped to win this year's prize and a long-term favourite, previously laughed off the possibility of winning the coveted award saying he didn't want prizes – as "that means you're finished". Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir leaving the Palais de Justice in Paris in 1970Getty/AFP Cold War politics and objectives After the Second World War, the second period of Sartre's career involved highly publicised political involvement – when the world was split into communist and capitalist blocks. Sartre embraced Marxism but did not join the Communist Party. As one of the first French journalists to expose the use of Siberian labour camps, he attacked what he saw as abuses of freedom and human rights by the Soviet Union. Sartre cited his conflicted loyalties between the East and the West as another reason why he declined the Nobel. Although sympathetic to socialism and the Eastern bloc, he had been brought up in a Western "bourgeois family" - and accepting the award would inevitably mean he had been "institutionalised in either East or West".

At the time, Sartre said he regarded the prize as a "distinction reserved for the writers of the West or the rebels of the East". "This is why I cannot accept an honour awarded by cultural authorities, those of the West any more than those of the East, even if I am sympathetic to their existence. Although all my sympathies are on the socialist side. I should thus be quite as unable to accept, for example, the Lenin Prize, if someone wanted to give it to me, which is not the case." Controversies Although Sartre openly said he regretted the incident had become a "scandal" – the writer was not the first, and certainly was not the last, to snub the prize for political reasons. Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges was nominated several times, but never won the prize. Some observed that Borges was omitted because of his conservative political views – specifically, because he had accepted an honour from Chilean dictatorship Augusto Pinochet. Borges' failure to win the prize contrasts significantly with writers who openly supported left-wing dictatorships – as was the case with Sartre.

Between 1901 and 1912, Sweden's antipathy towards Russia was cited as the reason neither Tolstoy nor Anton Chekov were awarded the prize. During the Second World War, the Academy favoured writers from non-combatant countries. The heavy focus on European authors has been a subject of mounting criticism, as the majority of laureates have been European. In 2008, Horace Engdahl, the former secretary of the Academy claimed that Europe was still the "centre of the literary world". "The US is too isolated, too insular," he said. "They don't translate enough and don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature." Related Jean-Paul Sartre: more relevant now than ever | Books | The Guardian Philosophy Jean-Paul Sartre: more relevant now than ever Fifty years ago, Jean-Paul Sartre refused the Nobel prize for literature. His reputation has waned, but his intellectual struggle is still pertinent Cafe society: French philosopher-writers Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.

Photograph: David E Scherman/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Share on Messenger Close In this age in which all shall have prizes, in which every winning author knows what’s necessary in the post-award trial-by-photoshoot (Book jacket pressed to chest? Check. Wall-to-wall media? Check. Backdrop of sponsor’s logo? Check) and in which scarcely anyone has the couilles, as they say in France, to politely tell judges where they can put their prize, how lovely to recall what happened on 22 October 1964, when Jean-Paul Sartre turned down the Nobel prize for literature. “I have always declined official honours,” he explained at the time . “A writer should not allow himself to be turned into an institution. This attitude is based on my conception of the writer’s enterprise. A writer who adopts political, social or literary positions must act only within the means that are his own – that is, the written word.” Throughout his life, Sartre agonised about the purpose of literature. In 1947’s What is Literature?

, he jettisoned a sacred notion of literature as capable of replacing outmoded religious beliefs in favour of the view that it should have a committed social function. However, the last pages of his enduringly brilliant memoir Words , published the same year as the Nobel refusal, despair over that function: “For a long time I looked on my pen as a sword; now I know how powerless we are.” Poetry, wrote Auden, makes nothing happen ; politically committed literature, Sartre was saying, was no better. In rejecting the honour, Sartre worried that the Nobel was reserved for “the writers of the west or the rebels of the east”. He didn’t damn the Nobel in quite the bracing terms that led Hari Kunzru to decline the 2003 John Llewellyn Rhys prize , sponsored by the Mail on Sunday (“As the child of an immigrant, I am only too aware of the poisonous effect of the Mail’s editorial line”), but gently pointed out its Eurocentric shortcomings. Plus, one might say 50 years on, ça change.

Sartre said that he might have accepted the Nobel if it had been offered to him during France’s imperial war in Algeria, which he vehemently opposed, because then the award would have helped in the struggle, rather than making Sartre into a brand, an institution, a depoliticised commodity. Truly, it’s difficult not to respect his compunctions. But the story is odder than that. Sartre read in Figaro Littéraire that he was in the frame for the award, so he wrote to the Swedish Academy saying he didn’t want the honour. He was offered it anyway. “I was not aware at the time that the Nobel prize is awarded without consulting the opinion of the recipient,” he said. “But I now understand that when the Swedish Academy has made a decision, it cannot subsequently revoke it.” Regrets? Sartre had a few – at least about the money. His principled stand cost him 250,000 kronor (about £21,000), prize money that, he reflected in his refusal statement, he could have donated to the “apartheid committee in London” who badly needed support at the time.

All of which makes one wonder what his compatriot, Patrick Modiano, the 15th Frenchman to win the Nobel for literature earlier this month, did with his 8m kronor (about £700,000). The Swedish Academy had selected Sartre for having “exerted a far-reaching influence on our age”. Is this still the case? Though he was lionised by student radicals in Paris in May 1968, his reputation as a philosopher was on the wane even then. His brand of existentialism had been eclipsed by structuralists (such as Lévi-Strauss and Althusser) and post-structuralists (such as Derrida and Deleuze). Indeed, Derrida would spend a great deal of effort deriding Sartrean existentialism as a misconstrual of Heidegger . Anglo-Saxon analytic philosophy, with the notable exception of Iris Murdoch and Arthur Danto, has for the most part been sniffy about Sartre’s philosophical credentials.

Sartre’s later reputation probably hasn’t benefited from being championed by Paris’s philosophical lightweight, Bernard-Henri Lévy , who subtitled his biography of his hero The Philosopher of the Twentieth Century (Really? Not Heidegger, Russell, Wittgenstein or Adorno?); still less by his appearance in Monty Python’s least funny philosophy sketch , “Mrs Premise and Mrs Conclusion visit Jean-Paul Sartre at his Paris home”. Sartre has become more risible than lisible: unremittingly depicted as laughable philosopher toad – ugly, randy, incomprehensible, forever excitably over-caffeinated at Les Deux Magots with Simone de Beauvoir , encircled with pipe smoke and mired in philosophical jargon, not so much a man as a stock pantomime figure. He deserves better. How then should we approach Sartre’s writings in 2014? So much of his lifelong intellectual struggle and his work still seems pertinent.

When we read the “Bad Faith” section of Being and Nothingness , it is hard not to be struck by the image of the waiter who is too ingratiating and mannered in his gestures, and how that image pertains to the dismal drama of inauthentic self-performance that we find in our culture today. When we watch his play Huis Clos , we might well think of how disastrous our relations with other people are, since we now require them, more than anything else, to confirm our self-images, while they, no less vexingly, chiefly need us to confirm theirs. When we read his claim that humans can, through imagination and action, change our destiny, we feel something of the burden of responsibility of choice that makes us moral beings. True, when we read such sentences as “the being by which Nothingness comes to the world must be its own Nothingness”, we might want to retreat to a dark room for a good cry, but let’s not spoil the story. His lifelong commitments to socialism, anti-fascism and anti-imperialism still resonate.

When we read, in his novel Nausea , of the protagonost Antoine Roquentin in Bouville’s art gallery, looking at pictures of self-satisfied local worthies, we can apply his fury at their subjects’ self-entitlement to today’s images of the powers that be (the suppressed photo, for example, of Cameron and his cronies in Bullingdon pomp), and share his disgust that such men know nothing of what the world is really like in all its absurd contingency. In his short story Intimacy, we confront a character who, like all of us on occasion, is afraid of the burden of freedom and does everything possible to make others take her decisions for her. When we read his distinctions between being-in-itself (être-en-soi), being-for-itself (être-pour-soi) and being-for-others (être-pour-autrui), we are encouraged to think about the tragicomic nature of what it is to be human – a longing for full control over one’s destiny and for absolute identity, and at the same time, a realisation of the futility of that wish.

The existential plight of humanity, our absurd lot, our moral and political responsibilities that Sartre so brilliantly identified have not gone away; rather, we have chosen the easy path of ignoring them. That is not a surprise: for Sartre, such refusal to accept what it is to be human was overwhelmingly, paradoxically, what humans do. The Swedish Academy, then, was hardly wrong to give the 1964 literature prize to the now-neglected philosopher writer: he was as great a writer and thinker as its members then recognised. It would just have been nice if they’d checked with Sartre first. Nobel Prize Rejected! - History and Headlines Nobel Prize Rejected! 2 Comments A Brief History On October 22, 1964, French philosopher and writer Jean-Paul Sartre became the first person to voluntarily refuse a Nobel Prize, in his case the prize for literature. Incredibly for a Frenchman, in 1945 Sarte had also refused the Legion of Honor (Legion d’honneur), France’s highest award.

Digging Deeper Sartre said that though he was honored to be selected for the Nobel Prize, he refused to accept it because he did not want to become part of the “establishment.” He also feared his acceptance of an award that had been issued by a Western institution might make him look as if he had taken sides in the East-West (Cold War) conflict of philosophies. Like many men of his era, Sartre was a chain smoker, but he further assaulted his health by regular abuse of amphetamines. He died in 1980 at age 74. He had been a crusader against war and discrimination and yet a supporter of capital punishment for political reasons. In his later years he went from espousing Marxism (but was a critic of the USSR) to becoming an anarchist. The Nobel Prize is the legacy of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish inventor of dynamite, who had amassed a fortune from this explosive. Awarded by Swedish and Norwegian committees, the categories are Literature, Peace, Medicine (including Physiology), Chemistry, Physics and Economics.

From 1901 on, prizes have been awarded 555 times to a total of 291 men, 44 women and 21 institutions or organizations. The first person to have been awarded prizes in more than one category was Marie Sklodowska (Madame Curie). In the meantime, 3 other people have been awarded a Nobel Prize twice. Members of the Sklodowska-Curie family have won 5 awards between them (Marie 2, Pierre 1, daughter Irene 1, son-in-law Frederic 1), whereas another son-in-law was the head of UNICEF when it was awarded a Prize. In addition to a medal and a diploma, Nobel Laureates are also presented with a cash award that is determined anew each time the prizes are issued. Lately the sum has been in the millions of dollars. The only other person to have refused a Nobel Prize was Le Duc Tho, a negotiator from North Viet Nam who was awarded the prize along with Henry Kissinger of the United States for their peace negotiations to end the War in Viet Nam. Tho refused on the basis that when awarded, peace had not yet been achieved.

Nobel Prizes can also be controversial, either because of who was recognized and why or because of who was omitted. T he Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to the newly-elected President Barack Obama before he had a chance to actually do anything generated much eyebrow raising and discussion. This award was seen as a slap in the face of the George W. Bush administration and was perhaps awarded more for what one anticipated Obama would do rather than for actual deeds. This decision cost the respective Nobel committee some credibility. Ironically, since receiving the award, Obama has continued hostilities in the Middle East and is notorious for ordering the massive use of unmanned aerial drones to bomb unsuspecting terrorists, sometimes killing civilians as well. The Nobel committees are also criticized for leaning toward the left in favor progressive writers and political activists over conservative ones. Some notable people who may have deserved a Nobel Prize but never got one include: Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain); Leo Tolstoy; James Joyce; John Updike; Arthur Miller; Eleanor Roosevelt; Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi; and UN Secretary General U Thant. History and Headlines Fact: In 2014, Malala Yousafzai became the youngest recipient ever of a Nobel Peace Prize.

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Historical Evidence For more information, please see… [AMAZONPRODUCTS asin=”1554077117″] Cover Images Acquired From: White House (Pete Souza) / Maison Blanche (Pete Souza) (The Official White House Photostream [1]) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons; [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons; Share story The Nobel Prize in Literature 1964 The Nobel Prize in Literature 1964 Jean-Paul Sartre The Nobel Prize in Literature 1964 Photo: Copyright © Lufti Özkök Jean-Paul Sartre Prize share: 1/1 The Nobel Prize in Literature 1964 was awarded to Jean-Paul Sartre "for his work which, rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth, has exerted a far-reaching influence on our age". Jean-Paul Sartre declined the Nobel Prize. Share this: To cite this page MLA style: "The Nobel Prize in Literature 1964". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 19 Jan 2017.

< Sartre on the Nobel Prize | by Jean-Paul Sartre | The New York Review of Books Sartre on the Nobel Prize December 17, 1964 Issue Jean-Paul Sartre explained his refusal to accept the Nobel Prize for Literature in a statement made to the Swedish Press on October 22, which appeared in Le Monde in a French translation approved by Sartre. The following translation into English was made by Richard Howard. Jean-Paul Sartre; drawing by David Levine I deeply regret the fact that the incident has become something of a scandal: a prize was awarded, and I refused it. It happened entirely because I was not informed soon enough of what was under way. When I read in the October 15 Figaro littéraire, in the Swedish correspondent’s column, that the choice of the Swedish Academy was tending toward me, but that it had not yet been determined, I supposed that by writing a letter to the Academy, which I sent off the following day, I could make matters clear and that there would be no further discussion.

I was not aware at the time that the Nobel Prize is awarded without consulting the opinion of the recipient, and I believed there was time to prevent this from happening. But I now understand that when the Swedish Academy has made a decision it cannot subsequently revoke it. My reasons for refusing the prize concern neither the Swedish Academy nor the Nobel Prize in itself, as I explained in my letter to the Academy. In it, I alluded to two kinds of reasons: personal and objective. The personal reasons are these: my refusal is not an impulsive gesture, I have always declined official honors. In 1945, after the war, when I was offered the Legion of Honor, I refused it, although I was sympathetic to the government. Similarly, I have never sought to enter the Collège de France, as several of my friends suggested. This attitude is based on my conception of the writer’s enterprise. A writer who adopts political, social, or literary positions must act only with the means that are his own—that is, the written word. All the honors he may receive expose his readers to a pressure I do not consider desirable.

If I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre it is not the same thing as if I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre, Nobel Prizewinner. The writer who accepts an honor of this kind involves as well as himself the association or institution which has honored him. My sympathies for the Venezuelan revolutionists commit only myself, while if Jean-Paul Sartre the Nobel laureate champions the Venezuelan resistance, he also commits the entire Nobel Prize as an institution. The writer must therefore refuse to let himself be transformed into an institution, even if this occurs under the most honorable circumstances, as in the present case. This attitude is of course entirely my own, and contains no criticism of those who have already been awarded the prize. I have a great deal of respect and admiration for several of the laureates whom I have the honor to know. My objective reasons are as follows: The only battle possible today on the cultural front is the battle for the peaceful coexistence of the two cultures, that of the East and that of the West. I do not mean that they must embrace each other—I know that the confrontation of these two cultures must necessarily take the form of a conflict—but this confrontation must occur between men and between cultures, without the intervention of institutions.

I myself am deeply affected by the contradiction between the two cultures: I am made up of such contradictions. My sympathies undeniably go to socialism and to what is called the Eastern bloc, but I was born and brought up in a bourgeois family and a bourgeois culture. This permits me to collaborate with all those who seek to bring the two cultures closer together. I nonetheless hope, of course, that “the best man wins.” That is, socialism. This is why I cannot accept an honor awarded by cultural authorities, those of the West any more than those of the East, even if I am sympathetic to their existence. Although all my sympathies are on the socialist side. I should thus be quite as unable to accept, for example, the Lenin Prize, if someone wanted to give it to me, which is not the case. I know that the Nobel Prize in itself is not a literary prize of the Western bloc, but it is what is made of it, and events may occur which are outside the province of the members of the Swedish Academy. This is why, in the present situation, the Nobel Prize stands objectively as a distinction reserved for the writers of the West or the rebels of the East.

It has not been awarded, for example, to Neruda, who is one of the greatest South American poets. There has never been serious question of giving it to Louis Aragon, though he certainly deserves it. It is regrettable that the prize was given to Pasternak and not to Sholokhov, and that the only Soviet work thus honored should be one published abroad and banned in its own country. A balance might have been established by a similar gesture in the other direction. During the war in Algeria, when we had signed the “declaration of the 121,” I should have gratefully accepted the prize, because it would have honored not only me, but also the freedom for which we were fighting. But matters did not turn out that way, and it is only after the battle is over that the prize has been awarded me. In discussing the motives of the Swedish Academy, mention has been made of freedom, a word that suggests many interpretations. In the West, only a general freedom is meant: personally, I mean a more concrete freedom which consists of the right to have more than one pair of shoes and to eat one’s fill. It seems to me less dangerous to decline the prize than to accept it.

If I accept it, I offer myself to what I shall call “an objective rehabilitation.” According to the Figaro littéraire article, “a controversial political past would not be held against me.” I know that this article does not express the opinion of the Academy, but it clearly shows how my acceptance would be interpreted by certain rightist circles. I consider this “controversial political past” as still valid, even if I am quite prepared to acknowledge to my comrades certain past errors. I do not thereby mean that the Nobel Prize is a “bourgeois” prize, but such is the bourgeois interpretation which would inevitably be given by certain circles with which I am very familiar. Lastly, I come to the question of the money: it is a very heavy burden that the Academy imposes upon the laureate by accompanying its homage with an enormous sum, and this problem has tortured me. Either one accepts the prize and with the prize money can support organizations or movements one considers important—my own thoughts went to the Apartheid committee in London. Or else one declines the prize on generous principles, and thereby deprives such a movement of badly needed support. But I believe this to be a false problem.

I obviously renounce the 250,000 crowns because I do not wish to be institutionalized in either East or West. But one cannot be asked on the other hand to renounce, for 250,000 crowns, principles which are not only one’s own, but are shared by all one’s comrades. That is what has made so painful for me both the awarding of the prize and the refusal of it I am obliged to make. I wish to end this declaration with a message of fellow-feeling for the Swedish public. Jean-Paul Sartre refuses Nobel Prize: from the archive, 23 October 1964 | From the Guardian | The Guardian From the Guardian archive From the archive, 23 October 1964: Jean-Paul Sartre refuses Nobel Prize The Swedish Academy awards the 1964 Nobel Prize for literature to Jean-Paul Sartre, disregarding a decision by the French writer not to accept the prize 10 December 1964: Jean-Paul Sartre (centre) dining in Paris with Simone de Beauvoir (right) and filmmaker Claude Lanzmann as the Nobel Prizes are awarded in Stockholm.

Photograph: Bettmann/CORBIS From the Guardian archive From the archive, 23 October 1964: Jean-Paul Sartre refuses Nobel Prize The Swedish Academy awards the 1964 Nobel Prize for literature to Jean-Paul Sartre, disregarding a decision by the French writer not to accept the prize From our correspondent Close STOCKHOLM, OCTOBER 22 The Swedish Academy today awarded the 1964 Nobel Prize for literature to Jean-Paul Sartre , disregarding a decision by the French writer not to accept the prize. This is the second time in 63 years that the winner for literature has refused to collect his award – and never before has a "possible" winner told the academy in advance that he does not want the prize. In 1958 the Russian author, Boris Pasternak, after accepting the prize later had to inform the academy that he did not want the award. In 1925 Bernard Shaw first refused the honour and the money, but later changed his mind and came to Stockholm to receive the prize. This year's prize of about £18,000 will probably go back to the Nobel foundation.

The academy met for two hours this morning to discuss the situation after receiving a letter from Sartre saying that for "personal reasons" he could not accept the award. But the academy stuck to its earlier decision. The prize was awarded, said the academy, for "his imaginative writing which by reason of its spirit and freedom and striving for truth has exercised a far-reaching influence on our age." Sartre, aged 59, who was in Paris when he heard the news, confirmed later that he will not come to Stockholm to receive the prize on December 10. French opinion seems to be divided into two blocks over this refusal by the "Father of existentialism." One defends Sartre and the other expresses sorrow for the loss of prestige. A very fair lady indeed NEW YORK, OCTOBER 22 Eliza Doolittle who in her triumphal progress from New York to London to Prague to Tokio must have been made into more national stereotypes than any other stage heroine in history, achieved her final Platonic form last night in the heavenly person of Miss Audrey Hepburn. She is as sensitive as a nerve-end to the slighted female whom Higgins and Pickering are handling like litmus paper.

We went out of the theatre reeling against the stupidity of what had always seemed to be Ibsen's fair comment on Shaw: "Shaw? The man who left emotion out of drama." Ibsen, I guess, never knew Audrey Hepburn. Alastair Cooke Sartre's 'Non' to Nobel prize came too late, say reports Sartre's 'Non' to Nobel prize came too late, say reports AFP• Pin it Share Stockholm (AFP) - A letter sent by French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre in 1964 declining the Nobel Prize for Literature came too late to avert one of the biggest debacles in its history, Swedish media reported Saturday. Sartre's letter arrived nearly a month after he had been picked as the top choice by the Nobel Committee, the daily Svenska Dagbladet reported, based on archival material made available at the end of a customary 50-year period of secrecy. The report throws light on the sequence of events leading to Sartre's decision to become the only person to willingly turn down the world's most prestigious literary prize.

Sartre later explained that he had "always declined official honours", including the French Legion of Honour in 1945, as it would limit his independence and institutionalise him. It had been widely speculated that Sartre's letter asking not to be considered for the award had been too late, but only now is this backed up with actual historical evidence. Sartre, who had been mentioned as a likely candidate for several years, sent his letter to the Nobel Foundation on October 14, 1964, saying he would not be able to accept the prize "either in 1964 or in the future", according to the paper. However, the Nobel Committee for Literature had agreed on Sartre as the top candidate on September 17, the paper said. In principle the decision on the year's winner had already been taken, Sartre was told in a reply from the Swedish Academy, which awards the prize. - Historic debacle - Consequently, when the Swedish Academy met on October 22, 1964, its 18 members decided to follow the committee's recommendations and award the prize to Sartre -- who, good as his word, refused it.

Had Sartre's letter arrived before the committee met in mid-September, it is likely that the award would have gone to someone else, Svenska Dagbladet reported. Some of the committee's members were ambivalent about Sartre's literary merits, and a letter from the famous Frenchman would have given them an additional argument against him, the paper said. There is only one known case of a Nobel being refused in advance: Swedish poet Erik Axel Karlfeldt succeeded in persuading the members of the jury not to award it to him in 1919, but he had the unfair advantage of being a member of the jury himself. He later won the prize posthumously in 1931 at a time when death was not a barrier to becoming a laureate. In 1958, Soviet writer Boris Pasternak was awarded the literature prize for his novel Doctor Zhivago and other works, but the Kremlin forced him to decline the honour. The only other laureate to willingly refuse the Nobel was Vietnamese prime minister Le Duc Tho, who did not want to share the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize with US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger for negotiating the end of the Vietnam War.

Reblog Why Jean Paul Sartre Rejected the Nobel Prize Why Jean Paul Sartre Rejected the Nobel Prize Topics: Nobel Prize Winners The Nobel Prize in literature has had an interesting and often controversial history since first awarding the prize in 1901. The year 1964 is perhaps one of the more intriguing stories of the Swedish Academy’s tradition. When rumors surrounding the nominees began circulating during October 1964, Jean-Paul Sartre discovered that he was among the writers being considered for the laureate. Immediately, Sartre wrote to the Swedish Academy to inform them that he wanted to be withdrawn from consideration. At that point, he was unaware that there is no consultation made with nominees. Much to his chagrin, Jean-Paul was indeed announced the winner of the 1964 Nobel Prize in literature “for his work which, rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth, has exerted a far-reaching influence on [the] age.” This is the point at which interest in the 1964 prize is piqued, and a few facts should be noted about both Sartre and the Swedish Academy’s Nobel Prize .

Let us first address the written refusal from Sartre addressed to the Swedish Academy, assuring them that he had both personal and objective reasons for refusing the award. Sartre cited that he would denounce the prize based on principles which were not only his own, but shared by all of his comrades. He wrote, “That is what has made so painful for me both the awarding of the prize and the refusal of it I am obliged to make.” Equitably, he had consistently refused any awards or accolade including the Legion of Honor in 1945. His humble conception of the writer and their task was that their work should be modest and self-effacing. The Nobel Prize in literature was established to award one for the most outstanding work in an ideal direction. More liberally, and with “work” defined as the author’s work as a whole, the writer’s literature is awarded for having lasting merit and consistent idealism. The goal, when founded, was for the Nobel Prize to focus priority on work which displayed ideals, principles, values and goals over concrete reality.

Examples of this type of literature is that of the spiritual realm, abstract reasoning such as the work of Plato, and existentialism, which Jean-Paul Sartre was certainly familiar with, having been a professor of philosophy in Le Havre, Laon, and Paris. Sartre was a leading figure of his time in the areas of existentialism theory and Marxism and a staunch socialist supporter. What his philosophical views means to the laymen is that each individual is responsible for creating a purpose for and in their life. There is no inherent meaning unless it is developed by every person authentically with passion and sincerity. This theory suggests that the existence of the individual precedes the essence, the crux, or the basis of one’s life and its significance. Sartre’s Being and Nothingness ends with “all these questions, which refer us to a pure reflection...can find their reply only on the ethical (or moral) plane.” One assumes, based on his principles, that he intended to create his life’s meaning of his own work in a humble nature. “This attitude,” he offers, “is based on my conception of the writer’s enterprise.

A writer who adopts political, social, or literary positions must act only within the means that are his own–that is, the written word.” Sartre refused all honors that would identify him as any sort of supra-individual or overstate his individual value. As a supporter of philosophical socialism and a Marxist, he believed that a truly free society meant that citizens would live within a classless and stateless political environment where private property would be abolished and the individual allowed to pursue and develop their own interests and talents. Certainly, these philosophical and political opinions influenced his resistance to any award that would imply his association with a specific social class, as he fundamentally disagreed with hierarchal positions. He protested associating his personal commitments (both philosophical and political) with any attached institution including the Swedish Academy and the Nobel Prize. In fact, in his rejection letter, he declared that “A writer should not allow himself to be turned into an institution.” The word “institution” itself suggests a social purpose to transcend the individual.

Commonly, the word is applied to customs and behavior patterns in a society and as a mechanism of social order, an “institution” would imply a society in which a class system would exist and would conflict with Sartre’s vision of a truly free society. An “institution” as etymologically used by Sartre in Being and Nothingness strictly fated men to individual freedom and that they each had a social responsibility. Along with his personal reasons for declining the prize, his objective reasons also touch on a bit of controversy surrounding the Nobel Prize . Critics asserted that the Prize was plagued with political influence and Eurocentrism. Sartre postulated that past awarded winners did not represent equally all ideologies and nations, and was concerned that his work would be unjustly and undesirably misinterpreted by rightist circles who would criticize “certain past errors.” Sartre, himself, disagreed with particular laureates of past awards, including, interestingly enough, Boris Pasternak who also refused the Nobel Prize in literature in 1957, though for different reasons.

With the insight offered by Sartre in his declination letter, he officially refused to accept both the award and the monetary prize, stating that, “If I sign my self Jean-Paul Sartre it is not the same thing as if I sign myself Jean-Paul Sartre, Nobel Prizewinner.” It is evident that he wanted to accept no awards which would add more weight to his name both literally and figuratively.

Question: Which Frenchman was awarded the 1964 Nobel Prize for Literature but refused it?
Answer: Jean Paul Sartre